The combative broadcaster’s memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career with some score-settling and a robust defence of his interviewing styleJohn Humphrys is the first to admit he doesn’t deal well with authority. He inherited it from his father, who refused to use the service entrance at the grand houses where he worked as a French polisher and, as a child, once watched his aunt get a humiliating dressing-down from the vicar for missing church. Humphrys had his own brush with condescending authority figures when he was in hospital with a cyst on his spine at 13, and an “arrogant posh bastard consultant” told his retinue of trainees it was because he didn’t wash regularly. “I don’t like being defined or told what to do, whoever is in charge,” he notes, a stance that has proved useful for grilling politicians (he has interviewed eight prime ministers), though it has also landed him in hot water.His memoir mixes engaging snapshots of his early career and analysis of the evolution of broadcasting with diatribes and petty score-settling. The early chapters tell of his passage from teen lackey on the Penarth Times in Wales, where his main task was standing outside the local church taking the names of those attending weddings and funerals, to being the first journalist on the scene at the Aberfan disaster, near Merthyr Tydfil, in which 116 children and 28 adults died after a colliery tip collapsed. Later he became a BBC foreign correspondent, reporting on the 1971 war... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2019-10-10 06:30:10 UTC ]
AC/DC lead singer Brian Johnson talks about a time in his life when he 'wouldn't have minded' a fiery death in a new memoir, "The Lives of Brian." Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-25 19:05:57 UTC ]
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From kissing Gwyneth Paltrow to beating up Justin Trudeau: Matthew Perry's memoir, "Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing," hits shelves Nov. 1. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-25 14:00:03 UTC ]
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An open letter protesting the acquisition of Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s forthcoming memoir by Penguin Random House, first reported in 2021, has begun circulating in publishing circles. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-10-25 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Sofia Samatar's "The White Mosque," a singular memoir about a journey through Asia on the trail of a Mennonite sect, tracks a personal search as well. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-24 13:00:39 UTC ]
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The art of pornography: Steven Heller recalls being arrested, as a minor, for his art direction on the underground sex paper Screw. | Lit Hub Memoir “Every woman who enjoys horror films has at some point felt the need to explain herself.” Elizabeth Horkley revisits Kier-La Janisse’s House of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-21 10:30:03 UTC ]
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The following is an excerpt from Joy Harjo’s The Art of Memoir and appeared in Lit Hub’s The Craft of Writing newsletter—sign up here. * At unexpected points in life, everyone gets waylaid by the colossal force of recollection. One minute you’re a grown-ass woman, then a whiff of cumin conjures... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-21 08:53:59 UTC ]
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The former children’s laureate shares her sometimes enraging story of rejection, determination and resilienceAt the beginning of Malorie Blackman’s engrossing and often shocking memoir, the former children’s laureate asks: “Why am I an author?” What she goes on to tell us certainly shows how she... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2022-10-19 06:30:17 UTC ]
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In his memoir 'Beyond the Wand,' Tom Felton shares behind-the-scenes tales from the 'Harry Potter' franchise and chronicles his struggle with alcohol. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-18 20:19:47 UTC ]
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Unsurprisingly, George Saunders is kind of a chaotic reader. | Lit Hub Ross Gay sings the praises of adult braces, feeling needed, and kissing a very small dog one million times. | Lit Hub Memoir “It is this uneasiness that helped me nurture such a wild and fucked-up imagination—an imagination... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-18 10:30:42 UTC ]
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The book, to be written with her husband Richard Ratcliffe, will detail her six years in prison and the campaign for her releaseNazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who spent six years in jail in Iran, is to write a memoir with her husband Richard Ratcliffe.The book, which is currently untitled, will tell... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2022-10-18 09:45:58 UTC ]
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The Hudson Valley-based Golden Notebook Bookstore will launch its publishing press next year with author Abigail Thomas's memoir 'Still Life at 80: The Next Interesting Thing.' Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-10-18 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Compiled from interviews he gave to a close friend, “The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man” sheds light on the self-doubt of the seemingly imperturbable Hollywood star. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-10-16 18:47:52 UTC ]
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"The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man" draws on reams of interview transcripts rediscovered after Paul Newman's death. Here's how it came together. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-16 13:00:47 UTC ]
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Compiled from interviews he gave to a close friend, “The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man” sheds light on the self-doubt of the seemingly imperturbable Hollywood star. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-10-16 09:00:11 UTC ]
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Flatiron signs a novel by Whiting Award winner Caitlin Greenidge, Legacy Lit nabs a memoir by podcaster Jonathan Conyers, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2022-10-14 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Prince Shakur’s debut memoir When They Tell You to Be Good starts with an argument between him and his mother which recalls the image of his father’s murder, a man he never got to know. In unflinchingly honest detail Shakur traces his own journey of self actualization as a queer, Black Jamaican... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2022-10-13 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Her win also marks the ascendancy of the memoir as the leading genre of our time. Continue reading at New Yorker
[ New Yorker | 2022-10-09 17:07:05 UTC ]
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“A woman is a useful symbol for the splay of land on which such a free man saunters.” Rachel Richardson on Thoreau, running, and the pleasures of not quite knowing where you’re going. | Lit Hub Memoir In praise of multiple narrators: Rubén Degollado recommends Dawnie Walton, Tommy Orange, Juan... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-10-07 10:30:18 UTC ]
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Jada Pinkett Smith's memoir will take readers on 'a rollercoaster ride from the depths of suicidal depression to the heights of personal rediscovery.' Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2022-10-06 19:59:48 UTC ]
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The French writer, who was awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature, blurs the line between fiction and memoir with spare prose she has characterized as “brutally direct.” Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-10-06 16:13:27 UTC ]
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